Roger de Clare, 3rd Earl of Hertford, is likewise said to have born the title of Earl of Clare. In the 3rd Henry II, this nobleman obtaining from the king all the lands in Wales which he could win, marched into Cardigan with a great army and fortified divers castles thereabouts. In the 9th of the same reign, we find him summoned by the celebrated Thomas-à-Becket, archbishop of Canterbury, to Westminster, in order to do homage to the prelate for his castle of Tonebruge; which at the command of the king he refused, alleging that holding it by military service it belonged rather to the crown than to the church. His lordship m. Maude (who m. after his decease William d'Aubigny, Earl of Arundel), dau. of James de St. Hillary, by whom he had a son, Richard, his successor. This earl who, from his munificence to the church and his numerous acts of piety, was called the Good, d. in 1173, and was s. by his son, Richard de Clare, 4th Earl of Hertford.

Complete Peerage, VI:499-501.

He appears to have been at once allowed the Earldom by Henry lI, and was certainly an Earl in or before January 1155/6, when as Roger, Earl of Clare, he witnessed the charter of Henry II to Geoffrey de Mandeville, the younger. In 1157 and in the following years he was engaged against Rhys ap Gruffyd in Wales. In 1163 ,he disputed with the Archbishop of Canterbury the latter's claim for fealty in respect of Tonbridge Castle, which was held by the serjeanty of being High Steward. In this he was supported by the King, but the fealty was eventually recovered by Archbishop Hubert. In 1164 he took part in the Constitutions of Clarendon . In 1166 he certified his fees as 149, and in 1170 was a commissioner to enquire into the proceedings of the sheriffs in Kent, Surrey, Middlesex, Berks, Oxon and Beds.